1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an image processing method and apparatus therefor for converting the color space of color image data in accordance with a color reproducible range of an image forming apparatus.
2. Description of the Related Art
Hitherto, there has been an apparatus for receiving color image data (multi-value data) supplied from a color scanner or the like and performing color recording by means of a color printer in accordance with the above-described color image data. In this case, there arises a case where the color characteristics (characteristics of read color) of the color scanner and the color reproducible characteristics (color reproducible range) of the printer are not equal to each other. In this case, instead of a discrimination being performed as to the range on the color space which is specified by the values (0 to 255) which can be possessed by multi-value data (8-bit) supplied from, for example, the scanner, an interpretation is made that the above-described multi-value image data is image data which is adapted to the color space range which can be reproduced by the printer. In accordance with the multi-value data, recording is performed by the printer.
Therefore, if the devices have respectively different color reproducible regions in a case where a hard copy or a soft copy of an original image is obtained, an interface for receiving/transmitting image data cannot be established, or data must be forcibly replaced with image data adapted to the printer side. In this case, if the result of masking cannot be compressed into 8 bits due to, for example, the difference in the color reproducible region, image data is cut to 8 bits such that data larger than "255" is made to be "255" and data smaller than "0" is made to be "0". Therefore, there arises a problem in that color of an original document or original image data cannot be correctly reproduced by the printer side and the original color is reproduced in a different color.